Your Diet Coke Won't Kill You

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When I was director of the Congressional Budget Office, I was testifying so frequently to the Senate Finance Committee that the chairman granted me a special exception to the committee rules: He allowed me to drink diet soda rather than just water during hearings. At my peak, I was downing up to eight diet sodas a day.

My family did not think this was such a great idea, and at their urging I have largely eliminated my diet soda drinking. Recent data from Beverage Digest suggest others are cutting back also; consumption of diet sodas fell more than that of sugary sodas in 2013. "While the health risks of sugary sodas have been publicized for some time, the growing public aversion to diet drinks -- with many believing artificial sweeteners are also unhealthy -- has caught the industry somewhat off guard," the Wall Street Journal noted.

This raises two questions: Why is total consumption declining, and is drinking diet soda harmful to health? Although the data do suggest a change in attitudes toward diet sodas, one potentially underappreciated factor in the consumption data is the role of demographics. Consumption of diet soda is twice as high among non-Hispanic whites as among Hispanics, for example, as data from the National Center for Health Statistics show. As the share of non-Hispanic whites in the population declines and the share of Hispanics rises, one would expect diet soda consumption per person to fall.

Independent Task Force Reports

Rates of heart disease, cancer, diabetes, and other noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) in low- and middle-income countries are increasing faster than in wealthier countries. The Independent Task Force outlines a plan for collective action on this growing epidemic.